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UK court sentences gay serial killer to life imprisonment for murdering man he met on dating site

Jason Marshall​
A sadistic killer who was caught on camera torturing a vulnerable gay man in his own home has been jailed at the Old Bailey for at least 39 years.
Jason Marshall, 29, listened to Classic FM as he handcuffed, tied and gagged Peter Fasoli and wrapped clingfilm around the helpless 58-year-old’s face.

He had posed as an MI5 officer and policeman after meeting his victim on a gay dating app.

The sickening events were replayed to the jury after footage was unwittingly filmed on a computer camera.

The killer nearly escaped justice after setting fire to Mr Fasoli’s bungalow in Northolt, west

London, while his victim lay unconscious on the floor on 7 January 2013.

Marshall flew to Rome four days later, where he strangled Vincenzo Iale, 67, to death with an electrical cord and tried to suffocate Umberto Gismondi, then aged 54, with a pillow within weeks.

By then UK investigators had concluded that Mr Fasoli died in an accidental fire – despite the fact that the victim unwittingly filmed his own horrific murder with his laptop.

Mr Fasoli’s nephew Christopher Murgatroyd discovered the ‘terrible truth’ when he examined his uncle’s fire-damaged hard drive nearly two years after his death.

Marshall, who was serving 16 years in an Italian jail for murder and attempted murder, was then extradited to stand trial for Mr Fasoli’s murder at the Old Bailey.

He was convicted of murder and arson after a jury watched harrowing footage of him mumbling a Latin blessing over Mr Fasoli’s body after asphyxiating him while scores by Wagner, Strauss and Mendelssohn blared on the radio.

Jailing him for life, Judge Nicholas Hilliard QC told him: “You realised he was weak, naive and gullible: in short, no match for you,” he said.

“I’m sure that you were motivated by a desire to cause Mr Fasoli pain without his consent, which would be a significantly greater source of pleasure or gratification to you than is ordinarily the case for those who enjoy inflicting violence.

“You tortured him for so long because you enjoyed it so much. It wasn’t necessary to go to the lengths you did if your only purpose was to kill him.

Following Marshall’s conviction last month, he said: “An examination of Mr Fasoli’s financial arrangements one would think may show activity after his death, and examination of his social media would appear to show he had a visitor coming that evening.

“Financial and social media records, on the face of it, would seem to be an obvious starting point and I would just like some help about that next time.”

The Independent Police Complaints Commission say they aren’t reviewing the case because it was the London Fire Brigade who concluded that Mr Fasoli died in an accidental fire caused by a faulty light in his cluttered bungalow.

Fire investigators thought an LED light had fallen from a ceiling fitting onto Mr Fasoli’s bed, which was highly flammable.

They found that the bulb was switched off at its wall switch and said it could not have been responsible for the fire unless it was switched on at the time.

The investigation team concluded that Mr Fasoli might have switched the light off after the fire started.

Marshall, previously of Forest Gate, east London, denied but was convicted of murder and arson.